Harry Potter and the Duty of a Shinigami
by PJ Animation
Summary: HPxBleach Crossover After a disasterous end to his fifth year, Harry starts to see ghosts. Not the normal Hogwarts ghosts either. Ch2, rewritten, so it isn't so graphic, and not deserving of a M rating. Discontinued.
1. Chapter 1

Hey, new crossover idea, I'm not sure if it's been done or not, so I'll just go with it.

Bleach x Harry Potter! Harry instead of Ichigo, lets see how it works out.

If my Japanese is wrong, please correct me.

I need a Beta editor, if anyone wants to do that for me. And, it'd also be useful if they could complain, so that maybe I'd actually get some work done in the end, rather than just stopping my stories.

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_**Harry Potter and the Duty of a Shinigami**_

_Chapter 1: Hollow and Shinigami?_

_- - - - -  
_

After fifth year, Harry Potter had been having a horrible time. During the summer, he lived at his relatives' house. His relatives who hated magic, and anything else abnormal.

Harry Potter was everything but normal, so his relatives continued to hate and despise everything about him.

For you see, Harry Potter was a wizard. He goes to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. He was probably the most famous wizard this century, as he had defeated, at one year of age, the greatest dark wizard of the century, Voldemort..

Now, normally, this would be weird enough, but things had gotten worse since the end of the last school year.

At the end of the last school year, Harry had been sent a vision by the reborn Voldemort. This vision showed a horrible scene, Harry's godfather, captured and being tortured by Voldemort's followers, the Death Eaters. But it had been a lie, a fake vision, made to trick Harry into coming to the Department of Mysteries, where a prophecy lie in wait. A prophecy that connected Voldemort and Harry together.

Inside the Hall of Prophecy, Harry, Hermione, Ron, Neville, Ginny, and Luna fought off Death Eaters over twice their number for over a half an hour, before help arrived in the form of the Order of the Phoenix.

The Order and the Death Eaters faced off breaking into small battles all around. Sirius and his Death Eater cousin were embroiled in a battle, on the dais in the middle of the room that held a dark archway. Sirius ended up being thrown through the archway, which Harry later learned to be the Veil of Death. Nobody could come back after going through it.

After that, the memory became fuzzy to Harry, who had lost it. He had gone chasing after Bellatrix, who had cast the spell to send Sirius into the Veil. He had found her, knocked her over, and performed one of the darkest curses in existence on her, the Cruciatus curse. The spell worked marginally, for it failed after a few moments, and Harry realized he hadn't the heart to work such a horrible spell, even on the one who had ruined his life so badly. The curse required pure and utter hate; righteous anger would not power it.

Once that failed, the night had kept getting worse. Voldemort arrived on the scene, taunting Harry for failing the spell, and performing it perfectly on Harry. The torture was cut short when Headmaster Albus Dumbledore arrived, and fought Voldemort to a standstill. Voldemort pulled a trick out of his figurative hat at the last minute.

Through the connection forged by the failed Killing Curse sent at Harry as a baby, Voldemort possessed Harry's body. The wracking pains made him plead for death, more so than even the Cruciatus curse. But something in Harry's mind triggered him to think of Sirius. An overwhelming power flooded through him, full of love for his godfather. Voldemort was forcibly flung from his body, and he fled after quickly retrieving the collapsed Bellatrix.

Harry had been brought back to Dumbledore's office, and had been told of the prophecy that only he and Voldemort could touch, the one that had been shattered in the battle. Dumbledore had a record of it in his memories, and showed it to Harry on his Penseive. Harry watched wordlessly as the illusory form of Sybil Trelawney spoke of his destiny.

_The one with power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches…_

_Born to those who have thrice defied him…_

_Born as the seventh month dies…_

_And the Dark Lord will mark him as his equal, _

_But he will have Power the Dark Lord knows not…_

_And either must die at the hand of the other,_

_For neither can live with the other survives…_

_The one with power to vanquish the Dark Lord will be born _

_As the seventh month dies…_

Thus goes the prophecy that had dictated Harry's life since birth.

Since that day, things had started to change around Harry. His moods became worse and worse, and he closed off more and more.

His friends became worried, and slightly afraid of this new Harry.

Harry had started to see ghosts after that day as well. This wasn't really unusual to Harry, as he lived in a world where ghosts were normal, but not this many. They were different kinds of ghosts though.

Rather than being the grayscale that most ghosts were, they were in full color, vibrant. On their chests, they had chains, coming from their hearts. It was the strangest thing.

But Harry had quickly gotten used to their presence. The grayscale-ghosts seemed to be able to see the other ghosts, and explained to Harry that ghosts lost color over time.

Once the year had ended, Harry had been sent back to the Dursley's, where he now resided. He had spent a few days wandering the neighborhood, against the wishes of Dumbledore, but for some reason, Harry couldn't bring himself to care.

But this was the day it was all going to change.

Harry awoke from his slumber without a nightmare accompanying him. This came as a surprise, as he had been having nightmares consistently every night since Sirius had died.

Harry sat up and stretched, popping several bones in his back. He released a sigh, and stood up, grabbing some clean clothes, and walking towards the bathroom. He wanted to take a shower before either of the fat lards he knew as relatives demanded him to make them breakfast.

Five minutes later, he stepped out of the shower, and looked into the mirror at himself. His upper body was covered in scars, remnants of the beatings he had received at the hands of the Dursleys before his Hogwarts letter. He growled. "Why do I keep getting sent back here? Aren't the wards based on _love_? They probably aren't doing a thing, if they even exist."

Harry slipped on his clean, too large clothes, and started downstairs to make breakfast for the Dursleys.

After making a whole family meal, and finishing his portion, he left the house. His new habit was to wander the streets in the small town nearby. Making it there was easy enough; it just took a little while.

Harry sat down on a bench to rest. He had been walking around for hours, trying and failing to find something else to do.

Then, there was a crash. A loud, bang.

A nearby wall exploded.

Harry watched wide eyed at the uncommon sight. What had happened?

Then out of the smoke and rubble, something moved. Something very large. As Harry started to see the outline of the creature, he began to think that it was a dragon. He stumbled backwards, off of the bench.

"Shit."

The smoke cleared a bit more, and Harry saw that it wasn't a dragon. Harry, in all actuality, had no idea what it was. But it was ugly as sin.

It was a giant humanoid type creature, with red and black skin that looked distinctly like scales, and had a large white mask over its face. Its eyes glowed red. If that hadn't convinced Harry that it was evil, the fact that it held a small girl in its hands would have.

Harry drew out his wand with a snarl. "Why does this always happen to me?"

He raised his wand, and swirled it around in a circle. "_Litis_." The battering hex did its job, and stuck the wrist of the hand holding the girl. The demon let go, and hissed at Harry.

Harry dashed forward, grabbing the girl, and running away as quickly as possible. This apparently, wasn't quite quick enough, as the thing appeared in front of Harry a second later.

"Shit!"

The monster brought up one of its large grotesque hands, and swung down at Harry. He held on tightly to the girl, and jumped back as far as he could. The hand smashed down where he had been a second ago, and left a giant print on the concrete ground.

Harry turned and started to run again, holding the small girl to his chest. "Let's get outta here, alright?" he whispered to her. She nodded silently.

There was another huge crash as the hand landed a few feet behind him. Harry stumbled, and both him and the girl fell to the ground.

They rolled over, and stared at the beast looming over them. It raised its hand again, ready to crush them both.

Everything seemed to slow down to Harry.

Lower…

Lower…

Closer and closer the hand came.

Then Harry noticed something odd. The silhouette of a butterfly had appeared between the hand and Harry. Harry focused on it, and it changed into the shape of a girl, wearing loose black clothes, somewhat like robes. A sword was hanging at her side, which she pulled out to attack the creature with.

In one slash of the sword, the hand of the creature was split. The girl pushed off the ground, and brought up her sword. And as she came down, she split the creature completely in half, making it disintegrate. Harry stared, wide eyed.

The girl looked over her shoulder at Harry and the girl, and then walked away.

"Wa-wait!" Harry shouted.

The girl just vanished around a corner.

Harry set the girl down, noticing for the first time he had been holding a ghost. She had one of the broken chains coming from her heart like the ones that he had seen at Hogwarts.

"You should really get moving on to the next world if you don't want something like that happening again." He said to her.

She nodded. "Thanks for saving me, mister!"

"No problem. But you should thank that other girl if you ever see her again. She saved both of us." Harry turned and started to walk back home. The girl vanished back into thin air.

**Dusk, that Day…**

Harry was lying on his bed, still thinking about the events earlier that day. He had spent hours looking through all of his defense books for any sort of creature that had a vague resemblance to that thing he had seen earlier, but had found nothing. Nothing!

And that girl, she became a butterfly. Was she a witch, an animagus? Or was she something else entirely? Harry hadn't seen a wand on her, but her clothes had been baggy enough to conceal one easily. But she had cleaved the creature in half using a sword!

_Damn it, I'm getting no where. There's no information on stuff like this in any of my books._ Harry snarled.

Then, the vision of the butterfly came back, floating in front of his face. His eyes widened.

Following the butterfly with his eyes, it came to the wall. It simply landed, and the wall started to fade away to blackness.

Out of the blackness stepped the girl from earlier. Harry got a closer look at her this time.

She wore Japanese styled clothes, a hakama and a kimono, all in black, with a white sash at her waist. The sword held in her sash had a square hand guard with the corners cut off, with two comma holes carved into it.

Her hair was short and black, with several spikes sticking down out in the back. One long bang sat directly between her two large purple eyes.

On her feet were white socks, and small thin sandals.

"Who are you?" he whispered.

She just looked around the room. Harry pulled out his wand.

"Who are you?" he asked, louder. She continued to ignore him. Her hand left her side to grip the sword at her waist.

Harry twitched.

Then her voice sounded. "It's close."

Harry stood up, walked directly in front of her line of sight, and put his wand right between her eyes. "Look, lady, I have no idea who you are. You can't just come barging into my room, then ignore me when I ask who you are. Now spill!"

Her eyes widened. "You can see me? And your stick, it's touching me!"

Harry rolled his eyes. "Of course I can see you, I've only been asking your name for last minute and a half. And yes, my wand can generally touch people. That's not so surprising, is it?"

She raised an eyebrow. "You… you were the one in the town earlier today. You were helping that ghost girl."

Harry snarled. "You just noticed!"

"You shouldn't be able to see me. Or those other ghosts. But you can see me, and touch them, since I saw you carrying her."

"So what? I can touch them, and I can see you. Why shouldn't I be able to?" Harry asked, genuinely interested.

She turned around, and looked back over her shoulder. "I am a Shinigami."

Harry just stared at her. "Okay… and that means what?"

**One Long Explanation later…**

"Okay, so you're a Shinigami." She nodded.

"And you come from a place called Soul Society." She nodded again.

"And your job is to vanquish evil spirits." She nodded a third time.

"So that means what I saw in town was an evil spirit?" She nodded a fourth time.

"And that evil spirit was trying to take the spirit of that little girl." And she nodded for the last time.

"Okay. I'll believe you for now. It makes sense, I suppose. You said that you Shinigami have a type of magic, correct?"

"Yes. Do you want a demonstration?" she asked.

'Sure." He nodded, excited.

"_Bakudō no Ichi: Sai_!" She stabbed two fingers into his stomach, and then pulled them back.

Harry snarled as his arms were pulled behind his back. His whole body tensed up, and froze as if it were under a full-body bind. Harry fell to the ground, face first.

"Okay, that's just a bit irritating. I think I can get out of this, just give me a minute." Harry said, hissing at the pain in his face.

"I wouldn't recommend it. That is high level Kidō, magic that only Shinigami can use. It's unbreakable to humans." She responded.

"Uh, sure. If you say so. I'll just sit here, trapped on the floor, being unable to move. Yeah, right." Harry snarled sarcastically. "At least my lungs didn't seize up; I'd rather not die from lack of breath. It'd be embarrassing."

The Shinigami let out a giggle. Then, her cold façade came back. She drew out her sword. "That ghost in the corner. How long has he been haunting this room?"

"Not sure. I've only been able to see ghosts since school ended this year. He's been here the entire time though. I'm guessing he's been in the room for a while, I just never noticed. Why?"

"It is one of a Shinigami's duties to send the spirits of the dead to Soul Society." She turned to the ghost, a man appearing to be in his late fifties. "Do not worry. Soul Society is a good place." The man nodded.

She placed the end of the hilt of her sword on the man's forehead, leaving a glowing blue mark there. The man started to glow, brightly, before sliding through the floor. Before leaving, he put his hands into a gesture of prayer.

"So, he got sent to that Soul Society place, huh?" The Shinigami nodded.

"He was a plus soul, so yes, he did get sent to Soul Society."

"A Plus soul?" Harry asked, inquisitively.

"There are two types of souls in the world. Allow me to demonstrate." She reached into the front of her kimono, and grabbed a small sketch book. After a few moments of drawing, she put a picture in front of Harry's face.

On one side, a cartoon bunny face was there surrounded by hearts of all shapes and sizes. The words "Plus, Good Spirit" stood out prominently.

"The good souls are called Pluses, they are the souls that you normally see around."

On the other side, there was an angry cartoon bear, surrounded by what looked like bolts of lightning. The background was black. The words "Hollow, bad spirit," were displayed prominently.

"The other type is what we Shinigami call hollows. They attack the living and the dead to try and steal their souls."

"Any questions?" she looked at Harry.

He just sat on his front, still bound by the spell, sniggering.

"What's so funny?"

He just burst out laughing. "Your… your drawings! They're terrible!" For another minute or so he couldn't form words because he was laughing so hard.

She stood, and walked over to his prone body.

…

_**WHAM!**_

…

"Ouch! Jeez, what was that for?"

"Back to the explanation. We Shinigami have two main duties." Here she held out another drawing. It had a bunny with an arrow pointing to a large flowery shape with Soul Society written in the middle. "The first is what you just witnessed. We use the soul burial technique, _Konsoh_, to send the Pluses to Soul Society. The second…" here she held out a third drawing. It had a bear right in the center, surrounded by cartoon explosion marks, and with a large "Kapow!" written at the top, "is to kill hollows and vaporize them." She drew a large 'X' over the bear.

"But why was the hollow after the girl?" Harry asked.

"I'm afraid I don't know. She doesn't seem to be anything special. We have yet to understand the full habits of the hollows."

Suddenly, a shiver ran down Harry's back. A loud screech filled his ears.

"Hey, did you hear that?"

She ignored his question and continued on speaking. "In any case, there is a second one around here somewhere."

Harry snarled. "Then why don't you go after it?"

"I have been… unable to sense it's presence for some time now. Something else is obscuring it."

"What are you talking about? Can't you hear that screeching noise? What else could it be?" Harry hissed.

"What loud scree-"

A screech filled the air. The Shinigami's eyes widened.

"That was the cry of a hollow!" she cried.

"I told you!" Harry shouted.

A human scream rent the air. Harry's eyes widened. "Aunt Petunia!" he cried out. She may have beaten him, and many other things, but she still was his only family. He didn't want her to die.

The Shinigami stood and rushed out of the room. "Hey, wait!" he cried after her.

"Harry! Harry, you've got to help mum!" came a voice from the hallway. Harry's eyes widened. Dudley was asking for help? From him?

"Dudley!" he shouted, as the fat boy collapsed on the ground in front of the doorway. After checking to see if he was still alive, the Shinigami ran downstairs, towards the screams. "Wait!" Harry shouted again.

Harry snarled: this was not his day. Twice, he'd run into these strange… hollows.

"Fuck it." He hissed. His muscles screamed at him, but he started to force himself to stand up.

He made it to the end of the hallway, before tripping and falling down the stairs. At the doorway of the house, looking out into the street was the Shinigami, holding her sword.

"Aunt Petunia," he hissed, putting all his effort into standing up again. He stumbled in front of the Shinigami.

She snarled at him. "Get out of the way. You'll just get hurt."

He snapped at her, "Shut up!" before his eyes focused on what was in front of him. There was Aunt Petunia, held in the grasp of a monster that looked similar to the one that he had seen earlier.

"Damn it." Harry took a deep breath.

Then he started to pull magic from deep inside of him. He tried to pull his arms apart.

"Don't! No human strength can break the Kidō! It's not possible!"

The air around Harry started to deform. It changed to blackness, and symbols started to appear in the air.

The Shinigami's eyes widened. A golden glow started to form from Harry's body. "What…"

The seals surrounding Harry started to fade away. Only the ones right next to his body stayed still.

Harry growled. Then he pulled more magic, and more and more and more, until he had enough to counter the spell that held him in place.

Finally, he roared. "_Finite Incantatum_!" thrusting all of his gathered magic into the Kidō spell.

With that cry, the spell around Harry shattered into dust.

Harry snatched his wand out of his pocket, and charged forward. Lashing out with the wand, he cast another super powered spell, "_Ventus Vesica_!" A long blade of green energy sprouted from his wand, cutting off the hand of the hollow, the one that held his aunt.

The Shinigami's eyes got even wider. The boy could use some kind of magic!

Harry waved his wand in a circle, and then jerked it back. "_Accio Aunt Petunia_!" he called, causing her to come flying to him.

The hollow looked over at Harry. "**I've found you…**" it screeched. It raised its hand, and attempted to smash Harry with it. Harry jumped forward, dodging the hand, barely.

Then, in an instant, the Shinigami struck the hand that was buried in the ground. She flipped over the hand, which the hollow pulled out with a scream. The hollow vanished into the blackness.

Harry shook his aunt. "Hey, Aunt Petunia, you alright?"

She didn't respond.

The Shinigami did, though. "Stay calm. She has not lost her soul just yet. I can still sense it. That is strange, but it appears the hollow is looking for a more spiritually dense soul. It makes sense now at least."

Harry stared at her. "What do you…?"

"That hollow from noon today wasn't after that little girl."

Harry's eyes widened.

"But…"

The Shinigami looked over her shoulder at Harry. "I don't know why, but until now, your spirit power has been locked up tightly. I was only able to sense a tiny amount, and that's why the hollows have never attacked you before. The only thing I can think of is that when you touched that ghost today, the spirit energy that was sealed away was released."

"In other words, those two hollows could tell you had a spiritually dense soul just by you touching that little ghost girl." she continued.

"They are all after you!"

Harry stared at her. "After… me?"

Nearby, the hollow started to reform "It's back, stay away." The Shinigami shouted.

Harry started to snarl again. "Oh shut up. Everything that's happened so far has been my fault."

"What are you…?"

"It's my fault that my family, the only family I have left, is getting hurt!"

"I'll deal with this myself." He snarled, raising his wand. He raised his voice. "Hey, bastard! You want my soul, right? Come take it from my cold dead body then!"

The hollow screeched, and charged much faster than something its size had a right to do.

It was beared down on Harry, and he was frozen.

Then, in a flash, it was over.

In front of Harry stood the Shinigami. The Hollow had bitten her, right on the shoulder, and she was dripping large amounts of blood. The hollow let her go, and she fell to her knees, blood spraying out of her wounds.

Then she fell forward, onto her face.

"Shinigami!" Harry shouted.

Her voice was soft, but she replied. "Idiot. You couldn't have fought it off, not without dying in the process. You should have known that."

Harry stared at her. "Or did you think it would be over if you gave it your soul?" She laughed a bitter laugh.

"At this rate, we'll all become its food." In the background, the hollow screeched in pain. The Shinigami had struck it in the mouth when it had bitten her.

The Shinigami crawled over to the wall near her and leaned up against it. "Do you want to save your family?"

Harry narrowed his eyes. "Of course I do, is there a way?"

"There is. You must become a Shinigami yourself."

Harry jerked back, as if struck.

"Place the point of this Zanpakutō over your heart, and I will attempt to transfer my powers into you."

The hollow screeched again, before it started to lumber closer.

"I know not if it will work, but we must try. There is no other way."

Harry nodded, his eyes resolute. "Let's do it then, Shinigami."

"My name isn't Shinigami. My name is Rukia Kuchiki."

The hollow started to charge for them.

"And I am Harry Potter." He spoke, as he gripped onto the blade.

The blade pierced Harry's heart.

Silence spread in that moment.

Light started to come from deep within him.

It shone almost as bright as the sun, illuminating everything around them.

The hollow froze in place.

Then, the light vanished.

The hollow's arm that was raised for attack was instantly cleaved off.

Harry stood on the other side of the hollow, a katana larger than him in hand, wearing the black clothes of a Shinigami.

Harry hissed at his sword. "Way too unwieldy." He concentrated his magic into the blade, and then jerked it back.

The blade shrunk to the size of a slightly smaller than usual katana.

"Let's go, hollow bastard!"

The hollow spun around, and swung the stump of the first arm back at Harry. He just raised the sword, and jumped up, landing on the arm. He jumped again, in front of the mask of the creature.

"Now die for the pain you've caused my family." He raised the sword, and stuck the right down the center of the mask, cleaving it in two. The hollow dissolved into nothing.

"And that's that."

- - - - -

And Harry decided; life would become quite interesting after that day.

- - - - -

**_A/N:_** Yes, I know this almost exactly word for word from the first episode, but the set up in the start was mostly the same. It'll deviate later.


	2. Chapter 2

Sorry **Z-Wing Dragon**, no Scythe in this story… yet. Maybe it'll come later, but not this early.

Hope you all like it!

_**Harry Potter and the Duty of a Shinigami**_

_Chapter 2: On the Beaten Trail, Mirror of Another Dimension_

A month and two weeks. Six long arduous weeks, of running around fighting Hollows. That was basically all he had done during that time, well, that and sleep. He was getting more and more tired for no apparent reason. Maybe the amount of physical activity was getting to him, but with all the running and walking he had to do at Hogwarts, he doubted that. Something else was happening to him.

Every morning, he would wake up at around ten, with Rukia sitting at his desk waiting for him. They would go out, and take out any Hollows that had popped up since the day before. The Hollows had apparently started to gather in Little Whinging, and Harry was attempting to cut their numbers.

He had found out some things during these three weeks. Several good, and several other bad. He was able to channel magic through his Zanpakuto, and it worked quite well. But the annoying thing was that he had realized that he hardly knew any worthwhile spells to practice. He had barely any battle type magic, nothing he could use against Voldemort.

So he set out on a quest, to find books that had good amounts of battle magic in them, as well as having Rukia try to teach him some Kidou. But both of these quests were failing miserably. He, having used human magic too much, was still too deeply rooted in how they do things. Thus, he couldn't find the right way to summon his magic for a Kidou spell. It was irritating him.

He had mailed all of the bookstores that he knew for any books they had on battle magic, but none of them came through for him. None of them had books on owl order for battle magic. Those were "store buy only."

It pissed him off. Here he was, just trying to find some good way to fight Voldemort, and nothing seemed to be helping him.

Jeezus, was it that difficult to find some way of destroying a homicidal dark lord with a passion for killing mud-bloods and half bloods, even though he was one himself?

Harry snarled at his book. He had decided to read through all of his school text books again, hoping that just maybe there would be something useful in them. Nothing, that was all he got. Nothing useful in the books. But, he knew he would do well on any tests from any of the years before materials.

There was a slight knock on his window, and he saw Rukia sitting there.

"Hey, stop thinking! We have a job to do!" she hissed at him.

"More Hollows?" Harry asked.

"Yeah!" she climbed into the room, and rammed her gloved palm into Harry's head. Harry wished that she had a… less painful way to remove his Shinigami form from his regular body, but it was not to be. The forcible tearing of somebody's soul from their body hurt like no other. He stifled the pain, and set his body on the bed to look like it was sleeping.

Then, he grabbed her hand, and pulled them both out the window, landing with a soft _thump_.

For several minutes they dashed, before coming to the source of the Hollow's spirit energy. Harry drew his sword, making sure to pull some magic from it, so it wasn't so gigantic.

His mind wandered for a few seconds as the Hollow watched him. He had found out that, while he could manipulate the size of his Zanpakuto, he couldn't change the shape, very much. He had been so very upset when he had found that out. He had so wanted to run around killing demons with a scythe. He could be like his own personal Death! It would have been awesome. But sadly, it was not to be. He could only pull or add magic to change the size of the sword, or only slightly the shape, making the blade straighter or a little more curved. At the moment, he wielded a fully straight blade that was about the same size as the one sword he had used before, the Sword of Gryffindor.

He stared at the Hollow for another moment, before jumping at it. Several of its many hands came down towards him, but he lightly slid between them. Before he could get a good strike in on its mask, one of the arms had pulled him back and flung him away.

He snarled at it. The sword in his hand shivered for a moment, and he pointed it at the hollow.

"Bastard. Ventus Vesica!" A green blade of energy erupted from the tip of the sword, slicing off about three of the hollow's arms. It cried out in pain.

Harry fired the spell off three more times, severing off the remaining limbs. The creature cried in its torment.

Harry quickly leapt forward, and ended the creature's misery. Even if it was a monster that ate souls, it didn't deserve to be tortured, for long.

The mask of the creature split, it started to turn to dust, blowing in the wind.

Harry nodded towards its remains, before turning and walking back towards Rukia. She smiled, "Good job," before turning and walking back towards Number 4, Privet Drive. Harry followed her.

They arrived back to see Vernon Dursley getting out of his car after a "hard days work." Anyone who knew him well knew that was a total lie. All he did was walk around and yell at people to do their jobs. Then again, Harry thought, maybe all that walking was hard on someone as fat as him. He sniggered, before jumping up to his window, with Rukia in toe.

They climbed through, and Harry settled back into his body.

They spent the next few hours trying to teach Rukia human magic, and trying to teach Harry Kidou.

Rukia was learning at a remarkable pace. She had gone through the whole first year set of books on magic, devouring them like they were rabbit-shaped Peeps.

She had practiced using Harry's wand, which was a surprisingly good match for her. She had complained about the need for a tool such as a wand to help perform human magic, but decided that if she wanted to help Harry, she needed to go to his school with him later, thus she would need to do human magic, and thus would need to use a wand. Harry had been surprised when she had first used his wand, without his permission, and cast the first year Wingardium Leviosa spell with no trouble at all. It was like she was a natural. And plus, no letter came for her. It was like she didn't exist to the Ministry of Magic, nothing she cast showed up on their monitors for some strange reason, probably because she was a Shinigami. She hadn't known about them monitoring magic before hand, and had taken his wand to try and cast an early level spell.

Harry was kind of jealous at how quickly she understood things. She took a look at the page for about a minute, swished-and-flicked, and cast the spell, perfectly on the first try. Then, she flipped the page and went on to the next spell. Harry was jealous, but then again, she did have somewhere around one hundred and thirty five years on him, so it made sense she understood things quicker than him. She also had previous experience working with some type of magic, unlike him had in first year.

The two worked quickly, adding the first half of the Transfiguration second year book to her knowledge. Then, a shout rent the quiet air.

"BOY! GET DOWN HERE!" his uncle's voice thundered.

Harry jumped nearly a foot in the air. He had to work to keep his heart and breathing steady.

Rukia watched him. "He sounds angry. What'cha ya do?" she asked.

Harry shook his head. "Nothing, but it's probably better if you get out of the house. I don't want to know what he'd do if he found you here."

Rukia nodded, and jumped back out the window. Harry resolutely closed it, before turning to face the storm. He opened his door and walked down the stairs to his Uncle.

"Yes, uncle?" he asked.

"Don't take that tone with me, boy. I know what you've been doing in that room lately. All you've been doing is sleeping and sleeping. It's not happening any more. If you have time to sleep, you have time to work. I have a list of chores I wrote up, just for you. If you don't complete them by tonight, I'm not giving you dinner, and instead, I'll be giving you a beating you won't soon forget," his uncle nearly shouted at him, throwing his hand towards Harry, with a list clamped tightly in his sausage-like fingers.

Harry grabbed the list, and took a look at it. His eyes widened. There was no way he could finish this in time! No way!

"Bastard," he hissed. His uncle looked at him. "What did you say?"

Harry smiled sweetly. "Nothing, uncle." He lied.

"That's what I thought, boy." His uncle's meaty fist slammed into his stomach, knocking the air out of him. He cried out in pain.

"Do your chores, boy. If you're lucky, you might get some food."

His uncle walked out of the room. Harry lay there, trying to recover his lost breath.

"Damn him," he whispered.

Harry slowly stood up. Then he grabbed the list, and read it again. He went about doing his assigned tasks until dinner, and was denied it.

His uncle glared at him, a gleam in his eyes. He took Harry's arm in hand, and pulled him up to Harry's bedroom.

When the door had closed, his uncle rounded on him, fist raised. "Boy! I told you to do your jobs before dinner! Why didn't you?"

Harry snarled at him. "How could I, when you gave me a list that would last anyone until the next day?" His uncle smashed his fist into Harry's face.

"Did I give you permission to talk? NO, so stay quiet."

"But," Harry managed to get out, before another fist slammed into his stomach.

He hissed in pain again, before looking defiantly into his attacker's eyes. "You won't break me, you know," he said conversationally. "You can't get rid of magic. It's impossible."

His uncle grabbed him by the arm, and pulled his face close. "So what? The world will be a better place with one less _freak_ in the world. If I do that, maybe then I'll be in the history books as one of the greatest human beings alive, for killing off a _freak_ like you. Once the rest of the world finds out about your kind, then they'll be clamoring to kill you all off. Any person who offed one will probably get a medal!"

Harry snarled again, before looking around his room. Everything was still in the same spot as usual. But something felt off.

He looked towards the window. And there she was.

Rukia sat watching the proceedings with wide eyes. Harry was getting beaten! By his own uncle no less! She had to do something.

Harry snarled again, shaking his head at her. He mouthed at her. _Get away before he sees you! This happens all the time!_

She stared at him, through the window. Then she realized something. The small outcropping she kneeled on had small holes in it, like something had been inside of them. There were other holes on the top too. Her eyes widened more as they connected the dots. Someone had put bars onto this window!

"_How dare they?_" was the first thought that popped into her head. "_How dare these… these… monsters do that to their kin? How dare they do that to a Shinigami? They are nothing compared to us, and yet they do such terrible things to him!_"

She snarled, and reached towards the window, intent on opening it up, and beating the shit out of that monster that was supposed to be a man. Harry snarled again, shaking his head more furiously.

He glared at her in a way that said "Don't you dare even try that!" She glowered back at him.

A silent conversation passed between them.

Rukia backed down, seeing the desperation in his eyes. Her eyes started to tear up. She nodded to him, seeing the relief in his eyes, before jumping back down to the ground.

A cry of pain split the quiet evening around her. She winced, and tears started to slide down her cheeks. She leaned against the wall of the house; listening in torment as Harry was brutally beaten by his uncle. Every cry rent her heart more.

She couldn't even do anything, totally helpless. She was no help to him. Her running tears turned to sobs, quiet but unrestrained sobs. She folded herself up into a ball as she heard a crashing sound that was probably Harry being slammed into a wall. Her head went down to the tops of her knees, and she cried.

She sat there, wishing for something, anything to take away his pain. But she couldn't help him, he wouldn't let her.

For two hours, she sat listening and crying, the cries of pain slowly dying down. After they stopped, she took a leap up the window, Harry's window, and peeped inside.

A few minutes before the beating had ended, Rukia had felt the magical bonds that held Harry back breaking and shattering. After his uncle had left, she had felt the magic itself flare up. And she looked to see what sort of damage had been caused, bad enough to not be repaired.

Harry was lying in the middle of the room, covered in bruises. His blood had leaked out, covering a significant area around him, although most of the cuts had been healed by Harry's magic. She whipped the window open, and jumped inside. Her hand crackled with as much healing magic as she could gather, and she slammed it into his bloody chest. The glow spread in an instant, removing most of the bruising from his body.

Harry let out a pained moan, but was not wakened.

Rukia took a moment and examined all of the wounds that covered his body.

She winced upon seeing them. On both of his palms, and on the back of both of his hands, a pentagram was carved, along with, on his right hand, the scars of the words "I must not tell lies."

Then, magic flared in his body.

She realized what had happened, again. His magic had been bound when she had met him, but ever since he had become a Shinigami, the magic bindings had been breaking, slowly but surely, one by one. His body had attempted to get used to the feeling of having more magic, which was the reason for his tiredness of late. Now that his body was in deep trouble, the new magic had started to go to work. It would heal his body, hopefully, leaving him without scars or other reminders.

And now, another one had broken.

With a sound of breaking glass, more of the bindings shattered, only hearable by one with magic. There was a flash of light, and a pure emerald green aura formed around Harry.

The only remaining marks on Harry's body, the pentagrams carved into his hands, glowed. The cuts closed, and covered over in scar tissue, before fading away, leaving no marks on his body.

Then with another moan, Harry Potter's eyes softly opened.

He attempted to sit up, but was pushed down by Rukia. His eyes looked up to her. "Wha…?"

With a hiss in her voice, she replied. "Your uncle. Why didn't you tell me this was happening to you?" she asked, tears forming again in her eyes.

"It's been happening all of my life. It's never been that bad before though. There's not really anything you could have done about it. It's not like I have a choice in living here," Harry responded sadly.

"So what?! You could have at least told me! I thought I was your friend!" she cried.

Harry smiled softly. "You are. But I couldn't tell you. I can't tell anyone. Nobody knows how bad it is."

Rukia's eyes teared up more. "But, why? Why haven't you told anyone?"

"It wouldn't make a difference. It would destroy the world's view of me, boy-who-lived-only-to-be-beaten-by-his-muggle-relatives. I don't want them to pity me. They can't take me away from this place. Not without Dumbledore's express permission. And since this is the _safest place_ for me, there's no reason to take me away. Not by Dumbledore's logic anyways. He doesn't listen to anyone but himself, and if he took me away from here, his plans would be ruined."

Rukia's glared at him. "You mean this Dumbledore person would leave you here, with an abusive family, just because you're supposed to be _safe_ here? HERE?" She shouted at him.

"Quiet!" Harry hissed.

Rukia snatched Harry's wand from the bedside table, and slashed it at the door. She created a silencing ward on it, so no one could hear her shout. She repeated her actions on the window as well, just to be sure.

"Damn it, Harry! Why? Why?" she shouted, as she closed in on him. She wrapped her arms around him, and he stiffened. When she burst out crying into his chest, he softened. He wrapped his scar covered arms around her, and just held her.

After letting out her tears, she sniffled. "Why, Harry? What's so important about you, that you have to stay in a place like this?"

Harry just looked at her sadly. "There is a prophesy about me, and Voldemort, the man I told you about, who killed my parents. He's the world's worse Dark Lord right now, and I'm supposedly the only one who can kill him. Dumbledore told me the prophesy a few weeks ago. It said '_The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches… born to those who have thrice defied him, born as the seventh month dies… and the Dark Lord will mark him as his equal, but he will have power the Dark Lord knows not… and either must die at the hand of the other for neither can live while the other survives… the one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord will be born as the seventh month dies…_' I was born at the end of July, and Voldemort attacked us on Halloween of the following year. I was a year, and three months old at the time. A year and three months, but he still came for me. He killed my parents in front of me. But then, you know what happened? He used the Killing curse on me, and it didn't work. I didn't die from something's that sole purpose is to kill. I lived, with one remembrance of the night." Harry pulled his bangs back, revealing the lightning bolt scar on his forehead that made him so famous.

Rukia gasped. "Mark him as his equal!" she cried. "His curse failed, and it left a mark on you, making you the one the prophecy was talking about." Tears flowed once again.

Harry shook his head. "I don't think I can do it."

"Why not? You could figure out a way."

"My main reason for fighting, my godfather, was killed by one of the Death Eaters, followers of Voldemort. That was the night, the night Dumbledore told me about the prophecy. I don't want to be bound by this fate. I just want to mourn and move on, but it won't happen here."

He heard a sniffle, and found Rukia, crying again.

"He was really important to you, wasn't he?" Harry nodded. "How did he die?"

Harry looked back at her. "He fell through a magical veil in the Department of Mysteries."

"A veil?" Her eyes widened. "What does it look like? What happened when he fell through it?"

Harry just looked at her, confused. "It was a large arch, with a fluttering black veil over it. When he fell through it, he just didn't come out the other side. They said he was dead, but I don't see how that could be. Unless the veil was a way to suck out souls or something." Harry looked back down at Rukia, whose eyes had widened even more.

"That's it!" the Shinigami girl cried. "The Archway to Death! It is the passageway that links the world down here and Soul Society! Some crazy German guy, Grindel-something or other, created it about sixty years ago. I don't remember the exact history or how it works, but it takes the body thrown in and destroys it, while sending the soul to Soul Society. Your Godfather is in Soul Society. Maybe we'll be able to see him some day." She said, happiness flooding her voice.

Harry's eyes narrowed. "But what about the mirror?"

"The mirror? What mirror?"

"Sirius gave me a mirror, a two-way mirror that connects with the one that he carries. I say his name, and his image shows up in my mirror, and we can talk to the mirror, and it comes out the other mirror. Shouldn't he have shown up on it, if he was in Soul Society?"

"The Archway has a flaw. It could only gather ambient magic from the atmosphere around it at a small rate. A person that fell through it lost their body immediately, but their soul was held in stasis for one month before enough energy could be gathered to perform a sort of semi soul Burial without a Shinigami, and send the soul to Soul Society, because it takes so much."

Harry's eyes teared up. "So does that mean, that maybe I can contact him? Now, since it's been more than a month?"

She nodded, and he ran over to his trunk. He opened it, and reached inside, pulling out the mirror that he had kept so desperately since it was all that remained of Sirius. He had broken it once, but repaired it, and hoped the magic involved still worked.

He reverently leaned the mirror against the wall so that it stood up, on his desk. He stared at it for a moment, before reverently whispering his Godfather's name.

"Sirius Black."

The mirror let out a fuzzy noise. Harry jumped back, startled.

"Sirius Black!" he said more forcibly.

The mirror started to show a fuzzy scene, like something out of a badly snowy television screen.

"Sirius Black!" his voice raised more.

The picture started to clean up, leaving only half of the screen covered in the static. Noises started to come through as well, but they were horribly quiet.

"SIRIUS BLACK!" Harry roared out.

With that, the picture cleaned up immediately, giving them a perfect view of the inside of someone's coat.

Harry's eyes widened, hearing, in the background, the voice of his godfather conversing with someone.

He heard his godfather gasp, and heard the sound of running, along with appropriate bouncing of the image in the mirror, proving that Sirius was running.

He ran for a few moments, before ripping the mirror out of his jacket.

"Harry!" Sirius cried, his voice echoing through the mirror.

To be continued.

**A/N:** So how's that for divergence from the original Bleach storyline, eh?

If you think it's weird that Harry and Rukia are such good friends so quickly, remember it has been six weeks of almost non stop being together. They're bound to either hate each other (like Ichigo and Rukia did) or get along really well (as Harry and Rukia did). At least, that's what I think would happen. Constant close proximity seems like it would make people become friends really fast. Harry could share things with her that he couldn't tell anyone else, since nobody would know about her because technically, she didn't exist. Thus nobody would go looking for her to try and find answers about him.

The Veil's only reason for existence was so that Grindelwald could get into Soul Society without a Shinigami Soul Burial-ing him. Since he doubted, after all the bad things he had done, they would actually not send him to hell, he decided to create the Veil/Archway and jump in it. He may or may not be a character later in the story.

Yes I realize that having Sirius still be semi-alive is kinda lame, but what can I say, it came to me in a flash of inspiration.

**2nd A/N:** Sorry, I was half asleep when I wrote and displayed that chapter, the first time. It was definitely not supposed to be that graphic, so I changed that section, hopefully making it a little better. The part with the pentagons is important though, so I couldn't change that.


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